5/28/98: More photography around the hospital campus, including vaccines for children, and Dr. Dan doing surgery…
NOTE: The main photo above shows a nurse at Karanda Hospital giving a vaccination to a child at Karanda Mission Hospital.
5/28/23: Dr. Dan and the staff at Karanda work incredibly hard under challenging circumstances, as the statistics show. As I mentioned the other day, they are in a rural area of Zimbabwe with no major city nearby, have a rotation of only 4 doctors and 30 staff nurses, yet attend to 200-300 outpatients per day, and up to 4,000 surgical procedures and 2,000 baby deliveries per year. With such a huge work load, I would expect exhausted, frustrated and discouraged people, but they were all so energized and cheerful. One has to wonder, how do they do it!?
Well, we saw behind the curtain just a little bit during our stay with them. Before and after the hectic pace of a work day, they did not fail to attend to all of those needs in another vital way: with their voices and hands lifted high in the morning, and on their knees in the evening. We joined them in chapel each weekday morning for a time of worship in song and a brief devotional. And we joined them at prayer meetings in the evenings. They kept a journal of the things to pray for, and kept record of the answers God has provided. We were greatly encouraged to see that they prayed regularly for Ruth and I and the work we were doing for them, as well as praying for us and the work we would be doing for others on the rest of our journey.
These dear brothers and sisters in Christ showed the way to a peaceful heart: being thankful, praying and rejoicing! They exemplified what the Apostle Paul wrote in his letter to the Philippians:
“4 Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice. 5 Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand; 6 do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. 7 And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” —Philippians 4:4-7
